


Just a Job

by nerdgul



Category: Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy
Genre: Aged Up, Fake/Pretend Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-28
Updated: 2017-10-14
Packaged: 2018-08-18 04:53:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8149738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdgul/pseuds/nerdgul
Summary: It was just a job. When Mandy offered to pay him to keep Irwin out of her way for a few days he figured what could be the harm?  He didn't mean to hurt anyone. and he certainly didn't mean to risk losing one of the few people he could actually call 'friend'.





	1. An offer

It was the day after fall break had begun. Junior had been looking forward to laying on his bed and wallowing in self-pity about not having anyone to spend the next week with. However, that morning Instead of repairing tiny figurines of himself that he would later that day break, he was surprised by a sudden ding of the phone. A text. Junior eyed the thing on his desk suspiciously. Not used to getting messages he figured it was probably just a trick of the senses. He went back to his delicate glue work, until it went off a second time. 'A wrong number' he thought as he continued working.

By the third ding he checked it, figuring it was probably his father asking Jr. to bring him something from home that he had forgotten to get before leaving to open the restaurant. One glance at the phone showed they however were not from his father but from Mandy. 'Oh'

Mandy 9:00  
'I have a job for you.'

Mandy 9:03  
'Come over.'

Mandy 9:10  
'Now.'

"SHIT!" Junior was surprised to say the least. Mandy didn't messaged him unless there was good reason. He got dressed immediately, knowing both how scary and impatient the girl he has once had a crush on could be. The last thing he wanted to do was keep her waiting and risk pissing her off. Grabbing his scarf and ran out the door towards the portal from his home in the center of the earth to the home of cousin Billy that the family kept open for their convenience. After all driving the drill 4,000 miles one way just to get to school and work was simply impractical, so Nergal and grim has long since set up 2 portals in their backyard. One that ended at Nergal's work and the other at cousin Billy's for the family to use.  
Junior stepped through the ladder portal coming out the other side in his cousin's yard. He then ran to cross the street where he saw Mandy coming towards him. Yeah. She was pissed, but to Junior's relief it seemed she wasn't much madder than what her normal facial expressions let on.

"Hello Mandy." He spoke out, thankful for his fairly monotone voice not giving away just how nervous he was.

"You're late."

"Umm, for what?" The boy was a bit afraid to ask, but Mandy did say she had a job for him. That meant she needed him for something so it couldn't be bad for him, right? unless she had some means of forcing him to do her bidding. Not like blackmail would be very effective given his social standing but with her who knows what she had planned.

Mandy sighed and looked the demonic boy in the eye. She seemed tired, and annoyed. Mostly tired. This made Junior ease up a bit out of sympathy. He hated to admit it but he still had a bit of a soft spot for her and despite being manipulated on a number of occasions by her he still considered the girl to be a friend.

"Look I’ve been extremely busy lately and Irwin won't leave me the hell alone. I need you to keep the dork distracted for me for a while. It pays 10 bucks a day. If i see him once this entire break, then you're fired."

"How am I supposed to distract him?"

"Figure it out."

Junior took a few moments to think about it. 10 Dollars a day wasn't a whole lot, he could easily make more in tips delivering pizzas for his dad over the break. But years of coming home tired from running all over town and smelling like pizza had taken its toll. Honestly, he wasn't sure how his father could still eat the stuff, working around it like that all the time. Though he didn't really need the money for anything right now so he supposed that wasn't much of an issue. Plus, he was essentially getting paid to hang out with one of the few people had could call friends. He liked spending time with Irwin, thought it was rare for them to ever hang out alone. They had plenty in common in terms of tastes in music and monster movies so keeping him distracted from Mandy for a week couldn't be too hard, right?

Mandy stared at him impatiently waiting until Junior nodded his head giving a simple "ok".  
"Great" she gave in a sarcastic flat tone. As if there were even a chance junior wouldn't accept the offer. She knew he would. And he knew if he didn't she would simply make another offer he wouldn't be able to refuse. They both knew it was just easier this way. and with that Many walked away telling him that he'd be paid when the job was done.

Junior nodded in understanding despite her not being able to see him. He sent a quick text to Irwin asking if he had plans for that day, and then walked back to the direction of the portals.  
It was still only just after 9:30 in the morning and junior figured the other boy probably wasn't even awake yet. He still had some time to get a little more gluing done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter. ill try and make the next one longer. no promises


	2. Killing Time

Junior stepped into his small home in the underworld through the kitchen’s back door, running into his mother, causing her to raise an eyebrow. It wasn't off for the boy to be up so early but it was odd for him to be out at this hour... or any hour, really. She sipped her coffee asking groggily where he'd been of to. He of course told her exactly where he'd been and why finding no reason to withhold the information. She nodded as she sat at the kitchen table with a now refilled coffee, to groggy and tried to do much more.

Junior decided to join her with a glass of juice for himself, having eating breakfast hours ago. They sat in a comfortable silence as he thought about how he would go about his new 'job', what he and Irwin could do together that was fun enough to keep him busy and Mandy off his mind. He figured he could just rent a movie and some video games from the dying blockbuster in town and if all else fails he could try to convince Irwin to teach him how to play that one card game he and Billy keep themselves busy with during lunch. Jr did always think it looked fun but neither knew how to play nor where to get the cards, so he always sat and watched or left to wander the school when they got too loud, yelling with their mouth full and spitting their lunches all over everything trying to out trash talk the other. On second thought maybe hit would be best if he didn't learn the game.

Junior looked to his mother across the table, who was slowly looking less like a wilted plant and more like the functional human being she was with each sip. Perhaps she could give him some ideas.

 

"Mom?" 

"Hmm?"

"Do you have any idea how I can keep Irwin distracted."

"Show some skin, honey." junior thought about how that would work. Being half demon meant that he had a higher body temperature and It was far colder on the surface than the comfortable heat of the core. Plus, it was fall! wearing anything less than long sleeves and pants would be practically begging to get sick! Besides how would wearing shorts be a distraction? He was about to ask his mother before she cut in.

"Junior no sweetie. that was a joke."

"oh." 

"You could go to the pumpkin patch. It's close enough to Halloween and your father broke our plastic jack-o-lantern last year when he tried to make pumpkin pie." She suggested.

 

Junior remembered that, the house smelled like burnt plastic all the way up to Christmas, when the burned pine tree smell took over. The boy thought about his mother's suggestion for a moment and thought it to be a good one. He put it on the mental list of 'things to do with Irwin' and decided to go with the original plan of just movies and games for today. After all he had to keep him busy all week, no need to do everything at once. With that the half demon smiled and thanked his mother. He got up rinsed his glass, and putting it away before leaving the kitchen to go wait for Irwin to message him back.

* * *

 

Irwin loved breaks from school. being a nerd was hard work! and finally having a break from homework and studying was the best. plus, now that he wasn't distracted by school he could finally work his moves to win over Mandy once and for all. He's stayed up all night working out the perfect plan to woo the beautiful scowling blonde. The first phase of his plan was already complete; massaging her nearly constant updates, compliments, cute emojis, and hilarious memes. yeah, he knew what the ladies liked. He'd also spent the entire day before not leaving her side, constantly trying to initiate conversation and taking punches.

Irwin knew her game. She's been playing hard to get since they were kids and he just had to wear her down. And he did! yesterday was a success with flying colors, he didn't leave her side once for nearly 9 hours straight! and when they did have to part ways he sent a near constant stream of messages! of course she never responded but he knew she was still just playing her game. And after such a great day he rewarded himself and his now bruised body by sleeping in until nearly 12. the second part of his plan didn't start until the late afternoon so he still had plenty of time to get prepped and ready to put on the  _moves_.

The boy got out of bed completely content, if not a little sore. He looked over to see that his phone was lit up. 'Mandy must have finally replied, yo!!' he thought as he dived for his phone next to the bed. his dreams were immediately crushed as he saw it was from junior. he let out a low groan of disappointment as he sat on the floor leaning against the bedframe. He contemplated not even opening the message and wallowing in his broken hopes but figured he ought to not be mad at junior for giving him false hope. especially considering the boy probably did not intend to do so. Plus, it was pretty rare for him to get a text from anyone much less Jr. so his curiosity got the better of him.

"Hey Irwin. You got any plans today? I was wondering if you wanted to hang out." Irwin let out a short huff. The message was perfectly punctuated, capitalized, and all spelled correctly. He people call him the dork, at least he understands text talk and emojis! Irwin would have used at least 3 smiling faces with shades and a questioning face. Maybe even throw in some object emojis to signal what they might do while 'hanging out' like a film camera or a cake. Poor Junior, he made a mental note to text him more often so that the boy may learn from his ultimate cool guy texting skills.

Irwin quickly send out a reply that he would be busy today and the rest of break. He also assured him that would've liked to hang out but can't let guy time get in the way of wooing his girl. He added in plenty of frowny and winky faces to assure Junior that he wasn't avoiding him. Irwin remembered what it felt like to have no friends before joining the 'slam poetry' club, which was just a ruse to keep his family from knowing he was in a rap squad, and he didn't want the guy to feel like he didn't like him. Even if Junior was a giant nerd.

Now that that was handled Irwin got up and went to shower and get ready for phase 2: Operation Spaghetti Sunset.

* * *

 

It took junior all of 45 minutes to decipher the hieroglyphics that was Irwin's reply to him. He would have asked his mother to help but she'd already left for her own job so he had to rely on Google and something called 'Urban Dictionary' to help. He tried a normal dictionary first of course, but it seems Oxford does not consider any of the words Irwin used to be English.

Once deciphered, Junior immediately rushed back through the portals to Billy’s house. He should have known that Irwin would rather be around his crush than spend the day with him. It was worth a try though. He would simply have to cut Irwin off on his pursuit to Mandy’s house. And speak of the devil there he was, nearly 2 blocks down and extremely well dressed. As they drew closer Junior thought about how Irwin really looked nice in a button down and slacks. It suited him much better than the usual t-shirts that he tried (and failed) to dress up with a bow tie.

 

"Oh, hey Junior."

"Uh, Hey Irwin. Wah- um what’s up?"

"I was just going to Mandy’s yo. didn’t you get my text?"

"Oh, no my phone.. died." He was a bad liar. Thank god, his voice was monotone enough to help cover that up a bit.

"Dude are you ok your face is all green."

'Shit he caught on!' Jr. flushed even more and stammered

"Y-yeah I’m- I’m fine. it's just really cold out."

"Oh right, you’re always cold. well, like I said. I’m kinda bus-" Junior panicked he couldn't let Irwin get to Mandy on the first day of his job!

"SO, WHAT DO YA WANNA DO TODAY?" He yelled to cut off Irwin, grabbing the boy by the arm and pulling him in the opposite direction of Mandy’s house.

"I already told you, yo. I’m going to Mand-"

"YEAH SURE WE CAN WATCH A MOVIE!" 'Just keep going Junior you're doing good' he pep talked himself in his thoughts.

 

Irwin was too put off to pull his hand away immediately. He was completely at awe with Junior suddenly being so pushy that he didn't know what to say. He snapped out of it after a few feet of being pulled along, and yanked his hand away. Nearly immediately after he was suddenly stricken with guilt. Junior must be really lonely if he was acting this strange. He felt really bad and decided maybe he could watch just one movie with him. After all he'd been so excited that gotten ready really quickly and had a few hours before he was supposed to woo Mandy with his amazing cooking skills anyway. Plus showing up too early might make him look desperate and ruin the whole plant. On that note Irwin decided to walk with junior, watching a movie to get his mind off Mandy would be a good enough way to keep him from showing up to early.

 

"Alright, I guess we can watch one movie. Uh, what did u wanna see yo?" 

'YES!' Junior though. he wasn't sure what he did to get Irwin to come around so easily but he decided not to think about it too hard.

"I thought we could decide that once we got to the rental place. I think they recently got some new releases in so we can look around there." that was also a lie, delivered a lot smoother with the extra confidence gained from Irwin now willingly following him. Junior actually had no idea when the blockbuster got in new movies or if they did at all. Actually, he was pretty sure that the blockbuster in town was the last of its kind and served purely as a graveyard for outdated and terrible movies so that they may rest in peace. Nonetheless they continued onward.


	3. Operation Spaghetti Sunset

It's been a relatively quiet couple of hours. The two boys had spent an upwards of 10 minutes at the video store trying to decide which movie they were both willing to watch again. Considering they were both complete dorks with little to no social life they'd seen just about everything there at least once so the decision wasn't to terribly difficult to make. A short walk back home, discussing their choice in movie, how each one thought about the movie likes dislikes etc. It was comfortable small talk for the sake of small talk. Even the movie itself passed by uneventfully. Each one of them quoting random lines and laughing at the same jokes they'd heard 100 times before. At some point Junior felt his phone go off in his pocket but was too engrossed with the movie to bother checking. Irwin however only half paid attention as Mandy never left Irwin's mind. or at least, not for long. Only during the good parts.

By the time the movie was over though Irwin was barely paying attention. He was instead going over the night ahead of him and his flawless plan. First, he would go to her house, at 5 o'clock. Convince her to meet him at a special secluded spot in the park, on the hill under the oak tree. He would tell her to meet him at 7 o'clock exactly. That would give him plenty of time to run home, cook some delicious fresh hot spaghetti, the most romantic of cuisine, and then run to the spot and set up a perfect picnic. Then Mandy would show up right at 7 just in time for them to eat dinner by the sunset. It was going to be perfect. There was only one problem.

 

"Hey Junior this has been fun and all, but I got other plans, yo. sooo.." he trailed off hoping that the other boy would get the hint that it was time to leave.

"Oh, yeah. but c'mon, you've gotta have time for just.. one more movie? ...Maybe a quick game?"

"No man, I gotta get to Mandy’s and start on our  _romantic dinner_." He may have swooned a bit much while saying that, but it wasn't like his crush on Mandy was a secret at this point. To outsider's he's sure he was a broken record.

"dinner? what are you making?"

"uh, spaghetti."

"I can help."

"Uh, thanks for the offer but I gotta go tell Mandy first."

"Why? Then she'd be waiting while you cook. Wouldn't it be better to make the food first? Plus, I’m a great cook! my dad owns a restaurant even. I mean it's a pizza restaurant but we make pasta bowls and stuff to. I can't make spaghetti"

 

Junior did make a good point, Irwin thought. No point in making her wait when he could just have it even more freshly ready for her, and this way he wouldn't have to worry about it getting cold. Junior might even be able to set up for him while he was getting Mandy, that way he could walk with her and it already be set up!

 

"Alright, you can help yo. But I wanna do all the real cooking. it's gotta be special, but if you could set up for me after then that'd be great, yo!"

"Sure." Junior figured that was good enough. He hadn't been able to make Irwin forget about his plans for Mandy but the more time he could buy the better.

 

With that the boys set to work making spaghetti. It was a simple task, boil noodles, press ground beef into meatballs and fry, dump in some premade sauce. Irwin for the most part was able to do this with at least some level of competency but for some reason he thought nearly an entire bottle of oregano, 7 whole cloves of un-chopped garlic, and a teaspoon of soy sauce was a reasonable addition. Junior didn't bother to correct him. Growing up around he had a bit of a loathing for all foods Italian so standing there and watching the other ruin a perfectly good spaghetti dinner brought him a small amount of satisfaction. Once the meal was cooked and packaged properly, Junior again began to scramble to find things to say in order to keep Irwin from going to Mandy's. By the time Irwin was nearly about to walk out the door junior in a near panic chucked the leftover sauce right onto his friend. Irwin stumbled but luckily did not drop the picnic.

 

"WHAT THE HECK, YO!"

"Sorry." the green-eyed boy meekly spoke. That probably wasn't the best idea. "Uhh, I.. slipped" He excused lamely.

"Great, yo! Now I’ve gotta shower again! and it's almost time for sunset, I’m never gonna make it on time."

 

Junior was at a loss for words, he needed to keep Irwin distracted but he didn't want to lose his friendship over it. No job was worth that. He decided the only rightful thing was to actually help his friend.

 

"How about you go shower. Th-the park is closer to here than Mandy’s house so once you're done changing you can just go setup and I’ll go get Mandy. How about that?"

 

Irwin let out an annoyed 'fine' before rushing to the bathroom, he didn't want to fail his plan on just the second day, so he accepted junior's offer without a second thought.

* * *

 

Junior rushed to the home of Mandy and knocked on her door.

"Shouldn't you be doing somewhere else right now? what do you want? "

"I don’t think I can do the job. I accidentally made Irwin really mad at me and I don’t want him to stop being my friend over this. You can keep the money just please come with me to the park. All you gotta do is eat spaghetti with him."

"No."

"But-"

"I thought you might wuss out on me. Check your phone idiot. "

 

Junior looked at her wide eyed. His phone had gone off during the movie he'd completely forgot. He pulled it out of his pocket.

1 picture message. Click to load.

He clicked and up came a picture of Mr. bonkers, his childhood bear friend, the most valuable thing he had, next to a can of lighter fluid. 'Oh no'. He stared at Mandy with wide eyes silently pleading with her to leave the thing that he loved alone. She stared back at him with the same cold dead eyes that she always had.

 

"You'll get him back at the end of the week. Just keep Irwin away from me."

 

Before he could even open his mouth to protest she slammed the door in his face. Great now his friendship was in jeopardy but his beloved stuffed bear was being held hostage as well. He should have seen this coming from her. Junior slowly started to walk into the direction to the park. Better deliver the news to Irwin than to just let him wait there and hate him for never delivering Mandy. That when it stuck him. Irwin just wanted Mandy to show up, she wasn't required to do anything else. This way junior would be seen as a good friend for doing what he said he'd do, Irwin would be happy, and the real Mandy would be far away from him. It was so perfect junior couldn't help but to laugh as he shapeshifted into the form of the girl. Black hair turning blonde, clothes, voice, and other physical appearances changing until he was a near exact replica of Mandy.

It was going to be perfect.

* * *

 

"YO, MANDY!" Irwin called from the top of the hill. Freshly changed with the picnic already set up. Junior was glad Irwin had spotted him from behind, it gave him enough time to quickly take off his glasses and stow them in his pocket before turning around.

"H-hi Irwin." He stammered and flinched at the sound of his own voice. The one thing he could never get perfect during his transformations, it always ended up sounding like an overlay of his own voice and the other persons. He made a note to speak as little as possible and hope Irwin wouldn't notice.

"I can't believe you actually came! What's up with your voice?"

"Ahh.. cold?" Junior internally cursed himself.

"Ohh it that why you would reply to me all yesterday?"

"Yeeah" 'Shit this was a bad idea, what if he starts talking about something that happened that junior doesn't know about.' Junior wanted to bang his head against the tree but withheld himself from doing so.

"Oh man, that suck, yo! but I bet some nice warm spaghetti would help that cold" Junior was not aware humans could wiggle their eyebrows like that.

"Yeah."

 

The two sat down on the nicely laid out checkerboard cloth and Irwin laid down their plates and handed junior a can of generic brand soda. Junior was nervous that the other would see through the charade so much that he did not think to tap the can before opening. Soda spewed all over his hand and dress and Irwin scrambled to cover him in all the napkins he had brought.

 

"S-sorry!" Irwin stammered trying to wipe the other down with the thin paper sheets.

"It's ok. It was my fault"

"Do you wanna nother soda, yo?"

"No thanks." Junior decided then that hurrying this 'date' along was the best course of actions. He quickly began to unwrap his plate, his (Mandy’s) tiny nearly nonexistent nose wrinkled as the garlic and oregano sent overwhelmed him. He was suddenly regretful that he did not correct Irwin's cooking earlier. He did his best to hold his breath and swallow large bites at a time but found the easiest way to stomach the pasta was to place it in between some bread making a sort of 'spaghetti sandwich. He hurriedly ate trying to get it over with as soon as possible but stopped when he noticed Irwin staring at him, batting his eyes like a lovestruck dope.

"Uhh"

"It is good? You seem hungry."

"It's... delicious."

"I’m glad you liked it.. I made it just for you" Irwin elongated his speech speaking in a low tone. Junior thought it sounded pretty.. nice. The light from the setting sun made everything glow a lovely hue and Irwin's dark brown eyes seemed like a glowing honey. Slowly Irwin began leaning closer as each word he spoke slipped from his mouth. Then he began getting a little too close for Junior's liking. started puckering his lips and closing his eyes and getting closer and.. closer ..and 'quick Junior think fast'.

 

Junior quickly held out his can of soda for Irwin to kiss Irwin immediately opened his lips touched the cold sticky metal.

"Uh-I think I uhh.. will that other soda"


	4. Sleep and Disbelief

Junior got home that evening exhausted and thoroughly embarrassed. Thankful he only had to dodge 2 kissing attempts before his friend got the 'hint'... or well 'a hint', being the irwin was assuming "Mandy" to be to classy to willingly kiss on a first date. He wasn't sure weather to be impressed with his acting skills or feel pity for his friend who didn't even come close to discovering him. He walked through the backdoor of his small underground home to greet his mother whom had been home from work for likely many hours now, as she was in the midst of performing her nightly ritual of 'winding down' with her favorite 'grown up beverage'. Jr only then realised just how late into the night that picnic had gone, without him noticing. 'time flies when you're deceiving your friends' he guessed. 

He walked through the kitchen shrugging at his mother's non-verbal question on if he wanted leftovers, she made a noncommittal grunt to let him know just how little fucks she gave about her son being out past 11 o'clock at night. He appreciated it, though he wished it would have been a grunt to warn him about his father waiting for him in the next room instead because when he walked into the living room he was met with a tall pitch black drink of sludge that he rightfully had the pleasure of calling 'dad' looking down at him with his arms crossed. 

"Hi, dad" 

 

"Jr... just where have you been? you know it's family game night!" Nergal exclaimed holding up a brand new innocent looking box of 'shoots and ladders'. 

In junior's defence he hasn't played a boardgame with his family in many years and speaking of them is simply not done under their roof, so in all actuality, no he did not know it was family game night. In fact they did not even own any board games as he and his mother had promptly burned them all in the firey pits surrounding their home after they could no longer take the older demonic man's outbursts to losing. 

"but dad- "  
Junior did not have the time to question or protest the sudden lift on board games before his father cut him off telling him to go to his room, and that they would play tomorrow and not to forget this time. 

So he did, retreating to his bedroom after the day he's had rather than trying to steal the game and burn it before his father got anymore ideas sounded like a better idea at the time anyhow. He decided he would deal with the game and his father after some rest. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
The next morning irwin had woken up early, full of energy and ready to start the day. Now that mandy and him were dating not even an early morning and a sore back from another night on a lumpy mattress could bring him down! He practically skipped downstairs to make himself breakfast, contemplating eating a nice healthy grapefruit half with a single piece of toast like his doctor recommended and quickly lost that thought. He was already a bit overweight and in too good a mood to spoil it just by trying to be healthy. Besides it's just one meal, it's not like this one breakfast of sugary cereal will curse him to a life of obesity. and so he settled in front of the television with a bowl of marshmallow diabetes and milk on the opposite end of the couch from his snoring grandma and changed the tv from the shopping channel she fell asleep watching so some nice sunday morning cartoons. He began to eat and zoned out thinking about about the next phase of his plan to win mandy's heart forever. 

Their date last night had been a huge success! They had ended up talking for hours about nothing at all. He'd never have even thought he would have so much in common with her. He could wait for today, he was going to - 

Just then he heard someone coming down the stairs. he passed a glance and saw his brother, melvin, sneaking a tall blonde girl in a short skirt out the front door. Irwin was thankful he was such a heavy sleeper, considering how thin the walls are between his and Melvin's rooms are and the fact that his brother was a constant player. He rolled his eyes, feeling a tad pang of jealousy followed by pity. his brother had always been the better looking more athletic one who got all the ladies, but his brother didn't have someone to love like he did. At least irwin had mandy, and now she even seemed to like him back! His poor brother would likely never have that, irwin nodded thoroughly having convinced himself.

once the staggering girl had been seen out, ready to make the trek of the well walked 'walk of shame' from the house of irwin's melvin turned to see hi brother. They exchanged a knowing glance, restating their unspoken sibling agreement of "don't narc on me and i won't narc on you". 

To which melvin said "Hey dweeb go silence your dumbass phone, it woke us up". 

He knew melvin was secretly grateful, considering otherwise they would've slept in and been caught, and was only saying that to let irwin know someone was trying to contact him. He was a jerk sometimes.. most of the time. but he was a good brother. 

Irwin got up to go check to see who could possibly be up and trying to contact him this early.  
He looked at his phone and saw 2 missed calls, both from an unknown number and 1 text. He opened the text message first. 

"Irwin,  
This is Mandy. I have gotten a new phone and this is my new number: 555-5545.  
-Mandy" 

Irwin was ecstatic to know mandy actually willingly told him her new number! normally it took days of spying and bribing people to figure it out once she changed it. 'she must really like me!', he thought. He was so happy that the fact that they had parted ways at a little pat 10 pm and that it was 7 am on a sunday, leaving no time between store hours for once to actually get a new phone, and her suddenly overly formal manner of texting didn't even cross his mind. 

Irwin quickly changed the number in his phone's contacts then hugged the small device close as he fell over onto his bed. He couldn't wait until this, when he could put into play his next plan, phase3: worm your way into her heart

The love sick boy then nearly jumped out of his skin as his phone went off for a second time. he stood up seeing yet another text from mandy! he couldn't believe it. 

"Irwin,  
Are you busy today? If not would you like to spend the day together?  
-Mandy"

Irwins hearts nearly fell into his shoes, not only did she like him enough to spare him the trouble of getting her phone number but actually wanted to spend time with him!! after so many years! he couldn't believe it, he didn't even know if he wanted to know what it was that made her change her mind after just one date! he was so shocked and so filled with jor he fainted immediately, just missing the bed this time, landing promptly on the old unvacuumed shag carpet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not updating regularly because school but don't fret I'm not giving up on this shit. and hey finals are almost over and the next chapter is gonna be a long one!
> 
> \---still editing: this chapter is unedited


	5. So Much for Heart Worms

Junior awoke that morning, as he does nearly every morning, at 6 on the dot. He cursed his half demon physiology for not needing a ton of sleep. Sure the extra free time was nice (well not really when he generally didn't have friends to spend it with) but sometimes his human half would make him sore from overworked muscles while the rest of him would be wide awake. Junior stretched out and went to the kitchen, remembering to stop by the hall closet to retrieve the new board game off the top shelf, and then turned on the stove, using the game to light the burner.

He made an egg for himself, sunny side up, along with a piece of well done toast to dip into the egg. Then he made a scrambled egg, charred, and piece of damp black bread for his father, whom excitedly walked into the kitchen upon smelling the horribly burnt food. His father thanked him for breakfast and asked the boy if he would like to come work at the pizza shop today. Junior declined, trying to make himself not look as if his skin were crawling at the very thought of putting himself thought the hell of another day delivering pizza. His father then pondered what it was he would be doing that day, Junior told him the truth, finding no reason to hide it, that he would be spending the day pretending to date his friend, Irwin, as if he were Irwin's crush, Mandy. Something about this however made nergal stop eating and look at the young boy.

"Jr. i think we need to have a talk.".  
Junior was confused at the sudden change in tone from his father.  
"about what, dad?"

"You see when a man and a ... man like each other very much, one man might ask the other man to... dance. and when two of you dance you get pregnant. and its my responsibility as a good dad to make sure to tell you that you're to young to dance. especially not with boys who think you're a different girl unless you plan on killing and taking that girls place and growing old with that boy like i am with your mother. do you understand?"

"uhh.. yes?"

"good son, now here, take this banana, and use it if you need to dance"  
Junior watched his father take the fruit from the bowl on the table and hand it to him. He was confused but took the banana. The young demi-demonic god looked up silently questioning his father why he would need this. Nergal seemed to catch on and simply said, "When i was your age i sat on a banana and it changed my life"

This did not answer any questions Jr. was having but he had long since learned to to think too hard about some of the things his father says. instead of pondering further, the boy took the banana and made a mental note that if someone asks to dance that she should decline and sit on the yellow fruit.

"ok, thanks dad."

"Now im going to work, wash the dishes and have a good day"

"bye dad"  
Junior stared at the banana for a while.

After a while of staring at fruit and contemplating existence and wondering what the fuck he was suppose to do with the banana he decided to pocket the fruit and head back to his bedroom to see what was planned for today, but not before seeing a package on his living room table that certainly was not there an hour ago. He opened up the brown cardboard box to find an old flip phone and a small piece of paper.

"Use this to pretend you're me and get Irwin to stop fucking texting me. ps, This counts as part of your pay -Mandy"

So mandy had given him an old phone loaded with minutes to keep irwin from her digitally also. Guess great minds think alike, considering she also came to the conclusion that this would be easiest if Junior were to simply pretend to be her. Granted she said nothing about doing that to Irwin in person, he still figured it was a good idea and any doubts he may have been having about the plan dissipated for the time being. He turned on the phone and started fiddling with it.

He the decided to call Irwin to let him know of 'number change'. It first when to voicemail, and considering it was still very early in the morning Junior figured the other simply was not awake yet. He instead then left a text message for Irwin to read when he awoke to let him know about the number. He then pocketed the phone and went to go work on his figurines. Unfortunately with old phones comes with the old school problem of 'butt dialing', which happened to call the most recently called number again. Jr had not even realised he had called again until he head a high pitched beep from his back pocket signaling that the he had left the longest message he could in the voice mailbox. Junior stammered in embarrassment and hoped Irwin would not check his voicemail to see 20 minutes of continuous silence. This time he decided to leave the phone in his front pocket instead and went back to work.

after some time of glueing little plastic statues on himself back together, junior decided he was bored with the action. His mother would not be awake until late in the day being that this is her day off and she drank quite a few 'adult beverages' before bed last night, so as his last option for social contact, he decided to text irwin again hoping that maybe he was awake and simply hasn't seen his phone yet, or that somehow by some miracle the ding would wake the other boy and free jr of his boredom. But his text came back to no avail.

He waited a while longer slowly growing more and more nervous as time ticked on. Junior sent a few more messages, and attempted calling 3 more times only to realise he had now used all his phones minutes. He eventually gave up all together and decided to try and watch some television to get his mind off of worrying thoughts. Afterall Irwin could be busy or just sleeping late... really late... by the time 3 PM rolled around Junior was worried and borderline panicking for Irwin's wellbeing. whatever was happening had to be serious for Irwin to miss anything potentially mandy related. Junior thought of all the possibilities, if Irwin suddenly dying in a freak accident, or maybe he's in a coma, what if his arms have been chopped off and he couldn't text back!? Junior was horrified, staring at his phone unable to concentrate on the cartoons playing before him. What if he lost his friend. Irwin was the only kid in school that he wasn't related to that was mostly nice to him. The only kid that didn't flat out ignore him. Even the school bullies avoided Junior due to him showing his demon side a few to many times... but Irwin was part monster too, he was never scared of him and actually talked to him. He'd heard so many voices from behind his back calling him a freak, but never Irwin's voice. He was probably the only person he could call a friend. Even Billy and Mandy were-

Junior's train of thought stopped immediately. his eyes widening in terror as the worst thought yet had crossed his mind.

What Is Irwin was with Mandy.

Junior was dead. he knew in that moment, that him, a semi-immortal being of hell and damnation, was dead. Mandy would kill him and bring him back and kill him again. The boy was horrified at all the things she would do if he had left Irwin annoy her for this long. Between the girl's twisted mind and all the powers of the Grim Reaper himself at her disposal.. he didnt want to think about it. instead he ran straight to her home, hoping to salvage what life he could and minimize the damage she was sure to do on both himself and Irwin. 

* * *

 

Irwin awoke that night in a hospital bed, disoriented and cold. He looked around the room, squinting his eyes at both the blurry vision from his glasses not being in place and from the blinding fluorescent lights. The sent of lemon cleaner and rubber gloves invades the boy's sinces causing him to sneeze. He shivered, the thin blanket and paper hospital gown doing little to subside the chill.

"Oh don't tell me we brought you all the way here cause of just some cold, baby. Now I told your father to leave you be and let you rest but nononono you were "totally unconscious, dude" and "needed to go to the hospital"."

Irwin looked over to see his grandmother in the chair sassily knitting a very warm looking sweater.

"Granmama, whats going on, yo"

"you in the hospital, baby. you've been out for at least 5 hours"

"WHAT!" Irwin couldn't believe he had been asleep for so long, he'd missed his whole day! he had it planned out so perfectly to! 'Phase3: worm your way into her heart' was suppose to go in place, they would go out dancing and have so much fun and he'd win Mandy's heart by showing her all his smooth moves!! what was he going to to now!?! How was he suppose to show up his movie he so dedicatedly worked on learning!!?

"don't 'What" me, child. Now hurry up and get up so we can show these fools your fine."

Irwin stood, wanting to get out of the hospital as soon as he could, maybe if he ran he could still make it to her house and they can just dance there, he'd pull up a playlist on his phone an- HIS PHONE. MANDY TEXTED HIM. HE STILL HASN'T TEXTED BACK.

"oh no, yo." he quietly whispered putting his face in his hands, to do all he could to keep from outright panicking.

* * *

 

 Junior had been standing outside mandy's house for all of 20 minutes before losing his nerve. if Iwrin was inside the house he had no idea, in fact the only person he knew was inside the house at all was mandy's mother whom just before he left he saw opening her window curtains and starting to get undressed very slowly. he wasnt sure why she or anyone would purposely get undressed in front of an open window, he supposed she prefered natural lighting, but still thought it to be embarrasing and looked away from the older woman's window. By then he decided to check to see if irwin was at least home first, and then finding out where he was in relative to mandy would come later.

luckily irwin did not live far, so he did not have far to run. Junior knocked on the door and waited as patiently as he could. He thought about disguising himself as one of the family members and simply letting himself in but figured it would be his luck the first person he ran into would be the one he was copying. instead he decided to transform into Mandy instead, thinking maybe it would make irwin somehow more likely to be there. he knocked on the door again and waited... and waited.. and then knocked again but louder. he hear a loud sound and a rude voice yelling "im commong hold on". 

opened the door was a tall young man, dressed in loose pajama pants, eating a pice of toast. He was somewhere in his early 20s and his abs were _rippleing_.. not the Junior noticed. Irwin's older brother, melvin, Junior figured. He'd never met the man face to face but Irwin liked to complain about him.  

"What?" he said, impatiently  

"Is Irwin home?" 

"yeah hold on" the older man rolled his eyes and turned back into the house and yelled "DWEEB". There was a moment a silence until the elder again called louder for his brother. Finally he decided to simply go up the stairs to physically retrieve his younger sibling, leaving the door wide open for Junior to see clear into the house. He wasn't sure if that was an invitation or not, but took it as one anyway stepping inside, careful to wipe his feet before doing so. nearly as soon as doing so he heard a loud girlish shriek coming from upstairs. 

Junior watched Irwin's father bolt up the stairs from the kitchen to see what was going on, he however stayed put frozen in fear, letting all of his earlier worries about all the possible accidents his friend could have endured surface once again. The next thing he knew he was watching Irwin's unconscious body being loaded on an ambulance, surrounded by EMS workers preforming a number of techniques to try and wake him. He watched until the ambulance was out of sight and only then was he able to move his legs. 

* * *

 

Irwin stood at the nurses' desk with his granmama and dad. the nurse and his guardians had been arguing for some time about letting Irwin leave. His grandmother took him by the wrist and was about to pull him out the hospital before a few guards along with the doctor stopped her. The Doctor had carefully explained for the 50th time that because Irwin was pre-diabetic and the they still don't know what made him go into a very short coma that it would be best for him to stay overnight. Irwin had tried to tell the doctors that he fainted from shock but they did not believe that a 'silly crush' could cause such a severe reaction. Irwin's grandmother had yelled over the doctors saying that it was just a cold and that the hospital's temperature was just making it worse, and his dad rattled on about the outrageous hospital prices, calling $900 for an ambulance ride 'robbery' and other such things. eventually Irwin complied with the doctor and his grandmother was forcibly sedated for punching a number of hospital guards and nurses. his father continued complaining about the bill but did so by himself in the waiting room without causing any problems other than annoying other waiting room sufferer's. 

The boy got settled back into his designated hospital bed, this time with a few extra blankets, thought they didn't do much it was something. Without much else to do he decided to sneak his granmama's phone out of her pocket and play snake to pass the time. He thought about Mandy and hopped she didn't think he was ignoring her. he wished he'd memorised the number. He shivered again, cursing the hospital for still running the AC this time of year. He looked back over to his granmama, the sweater she was knitting was sticking out her purse. it was only halfway dont but he figured a croptop sweater was better than no sweater, and put it on. 

* * *

 

junior was out of breath by the time he reached the hospital's front desk. He had to run back to billy's home to take the portal back to his own home so he could portal to the restaurant which was still a number of blocks down from the hospital. Taking the bus would have likely been a lot faster but Junior could not think due to the fact that his friend could be dead. He however did make a mental note to get his dad to instal a portal to the hospital in the event of an emergency.

the nurse had nearly checked Junior in the emergency ward as his face was flush gree as he was trying to speak and catch his breath at the same time made it seem he was having a severe reaction to something. but he had assured her that he was fine and asked where Irwin's room was.

"Im sorry but only family is allowed to visit right now." The nurse stated calmly.

"but i am his family, im his uhh. brother"

"you mean he's your brother?"

"right! he's my brother"

The nurse looked at him suspiciously, junior gulped hoping she would not catch onto his lie until he realized what she was probably thinking. 

"he's my _step_ -brother" this either satisfied the nurse's suspicion about their differing race or she simply did not care enough to call out junior's lie. She gave him the number, he thanked her and quickly went for the elevator.   

He breathed out a sigh of relief when the elevator opened up on the non-critical floor, meaning irwin was alive and well enough to not be dying any time soon. He walked through the halls looking for the room number given by the nurse. once he found it and saw a bit of brown hair through the small window on the door he was finally able to calm some more, with his fear for his friend's well being turning into nervousness about how to go about next. he decided it best to knock lightly on the door in case the boy was sleeping, but there was no such luck as Irwin called to come in, and so junior did.

upon stepping junior noticed first the old lady in a chair, heavily snoring, secondly just how much colder it was in this room than the rest of the hospital, and only thirdly how cute Irwin looked bundled up in five hospital blankets with just his head and hands poking out as he fiddled around with an old phone. junior was a bit hurt that irwin had not responded to any of his messages despite having his phone on him, but quickly pushed that aside. afterall irwin wasn't ignoring him, he was ignoring what he thought to be mandy.  

upon seeing junior, irwin immediately sat up. junior had to stop himself from laughing at the half sweater irwin was wearing over his paper hospital gown. or at least, he tried to. irwin stammered to bewildered to be embarrassed by his attire. 

"Mandy?"

'oh shit' junior thought. he'd entirely forgotten he still looked like mandy, junior wasn't the best actor but he knew this had to be entirely out of character for her and now irwin was going to find out and he'll hate him for lieing and and-

"You came, yo!"

'maybe Irwin is more dense than you thought.'

"y-yeah. you didn't answer your phone and when i went to your house there was an ambulance. i was worried" 

irwin sprang out of bed to hug him, he'd always knew somewhere deep down that somewhere mandy cared about him. he squeezed the other tight thanking him for coming and apologizing for not replying earlier and making him worry. 

they parted and irwin was beaming. for some reason this made the other boy feel heavy, but he faked a smile back for his friend's sake. 

"cool glasses by the way" 

'shit' junior quickly removed his green tinted glassed, amazed that just that wasn't a dead giveaway. 

"th-anks. cool.. sweater" at this Irwin finally let himself flush in embarrassment. 

"i don't know what they did with my clothes, yo" he admitted, granted the hello kitty pajamas would likely not be much better at protecting his dignity. 

 "oh" junior replied. they stood there for a while in silence. junior attempted to break the silences with a "so uhh.." but it went nowhere. 

irwin successfully broke the silence when he piped up "well you wanted to hang out today right? im.. not allowed to leave but we can still.. if you want?"

junior didn't see much reason to stay, visiting hours were well over and he'd be kicked out soon enough anyway as soon as one happens by that actually cares about those rules, and there wasn't exactly much to do in the hospital room, plus there wasn't any chance of irwin leaving to go bother the real mandy so he didnt have to worry about that either. both considering and then ignoring all that junior decided to stay.  

"so what do you want to do?" the crossdressing male asked with a shrug.  

 "well, i was gonna take you out dancing to this once place..." irwin trailed off searching for his granmama's phone again. he tapped a few buttons and some fast generic hip-hop music started playing. "..you wanna dance, yo?". Irwin offered his hand to the other. junior hesitated vaguely remembering what his father said earlier that morning. 

"isn't that gonna wake your grandma?" junior asked, trying to avoid any rhythmic moving that irwin may or may not be doing. 

"nah, she's out, yo. they sedated her with some heavy stuff" irwin waved off junior's concerned and offered his hand again with a 'common, it'll be fun'. Junior sighed knowing he would not be able to refuse such an enticing offer of fun. they awkwardly moved a bit in the small room, irwin attempted to do 'the worm' claiming to have 'totally mastered the technique' only to wiggle on the floor looking like a dying fish, who's hospital gown flapped around exposing the tighty whities underneath. that time junior could not try to stifle his laughter. they both laughed together until the youtube playlist switched to something slower. it reminded junior of the first and only other time they'd danced together. junior smiled at the memory and didnt even think about it when irwin grabbed his hand to slow dance to the new song

"is that a banana in your pocket or are you happy to see me', irwin purred then stopped in his tracks remembering mandy is indeed female. Junior remebered again his talk with his father and quickly pulled out the banana. she stumbled throwing it on the ground, shit shit, he did NOT want to get pregnet, fuck, what was he suppose to do again? stand on it? right yeah. junior immidiatly stepped on the banana, mushy fruit coating his shoe, he'd put a bit too much weight on it and slipped right onto his back. Irwin panics confused at what was happening and accidentally stepped in the mushy pile of banana and peel and slipped right on top of the other. junior could barely breathe due to irwin's weight being directly on top of him, their faces inches apart. they both then laughed uncontrollably, junior couldn't think of another time that he'd laughed so hard. next thing he knew Irwin's lips were on his, and he was choking being cut off mid belly laugh. they both sat up, irwin patting jr on the back letting him cough. 

"sorry" 

"it's fine"  he said once he started to regain composure.

"you, uh, wanna.. try again?"  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woop, finnally done. i promised a longer chapter and here ya go. lots of gay, and shannonigans and hey they actually kiss! neat
> 
> i think this may be the half way point for this fic?? idk, im kinda making it up as i go but i think this is a solid half way point.


	6. Regret

"you, uh, wanna.. try again?"

Junior could not believe what had come out his own mouth.

Irwin could NOT BELIEVE what had come out of "MANDY'S" mouth. Kissing wasn't suppose to happen until phase 8, at least!! But he figured he'd might as well seize the opportunity, thus without hesitation he blurted out "YES!" voice cracking in excitement. He blushed and coughed a few times before doing his best to put on a deeper and hopefully more seductive voice. It wasn't very seductive, more like something you'd expect to hear from a frog that's had too much soda, but I digress.  

 

"I mean, yeah sure ok, yo."  

Junior would have snorted at the boy's very poor attempt of trying to cover up for being over excited, if his own heart were not beating out his chest. He was still trying to processes the fact he just offered to KISS Irwin, and the fact that he was kind of excited to kiss IRWIN, and the fact that HOLY FUCK HE'S **_KISSING IRWIN_.**  

 

It was quick and Irwin's nose bleed a little and by a little I mean a lot because it got all over the both of them. They both felt a little more than dizzy one from the nerves the other moreso from bloodloss. Junior worriedly asked if Irwin needed him to get the nurse, knowing that that's probably not good for humans to lose that much blood... even though Irwin was more not human than human, it still didn't seem like a good idea. He was almost halfway out the door, before Irwin pulled the other back in not wanting to ruin 'the mood'. Junior decided not to mention that being bleed profusely on would generally ruin most 'moods'. Irwin knew this anyway but still hung onto a desperate hope that 'Mandy' either didn't mind or was into it. I mean, goth chicks liked that kind of stuff right? Was Mandy even considered goth if she didn't really wear black a lot?? She acted goth. Plus she hangs around with the literal embodiment of death so thats gotta count for something? ...   

 

Irwin clung to the Mandy impersonator for at least 2 minutes before realising he'd just stood there saying nothing, not that Junior minded. He kinda liked the face Irwin made when thinking, it was a dumb spaced out kinda look, sometimes with a little droll. It was almost... cute. Junior tried not to let this thought take over though as they were both covered in blood and the boy before him probably needs medical attention. At least the bleeding stopped by the time Irwin actually got around to making his mouth, his wonderfully soft plump mouth with those thick lip- uh.. Before he spoke.  

 

"I mean.. uh the nurse will probably make you leave when she sees all the blood, yo. Stay for a little longer?"  Irwin said, trying not to sound like he was pleading. 

Jr was nervous and part of him kinda wanted to leave and hide away to write in his ~~diary~~ totally manly journal about the whole event to try and sort out all the feelings running through him, but an even bigger part wanted to forget thinking about feelings and spend as much time with the other boy as possible.

 

Junior said ok with a shy nod and asked what they should do next. Irwin weighed his options between cleaning up and not cleaning up but the boy is lazy and lighthead thus quickly decided he wanted a nap. It totally wasn't an excuse to see if he could skip any more of the plan's phases to get Mandy to marry him. Mandy was a respectable lady after all! Granted the quicker the plan was done, the quicker he'd have the girl of his dreams on his arm, and the more time they'd have left during break to bask in each other's love and adoration and eat chocolate covered fruits while basking in the evening light. 

 

"How 'bout we- " 

 

"Who's that, baby?"  A groggy voice came from the corner grabbing both boys' attention. 

 

"Oh no, yo." Irwin tried not to think to loud but it came out verbally anyway. His grandmama had awaken and with that all chance of hospital bed napping with the girl of his dreams are out the window... for now. He was a fool to hope. He was a fool to forget that his grandmama was in the room. The very woman who had the most power to embarrass him in front of Mandy and ruin everything he'd worked for!

Plus he stole her half finished sweater and it had already unraveled a bit and was covered in blood and oh god, she was not gonna be happy with her grandsons impatiens! And oh god how long has she even been awake!!?? Irwin had to think quick.

 

"Uh, no one grandmama.. You're .. Youre just dreamin', yo!" Irwin began pushing "Mandy" out the room with a quiet 'sorry, yo'.  

Junior was confused but figured it best to comply to Irwin's directional shovings. He left the room quickly and stood outside the door for a few moments in utter confusion until a loud thump from inside the room shocked him out of his curiosity. He made his way to the nurses station and told the nurse that he thinks there might be some trouble in Irwin's room, and hearing this from something appearing to be a girl covered in blood the nurses bolted to go see the 'trouble'. Junior tried to leave before one of the other nurses could get ahold of him, but nurses are a slippery breed and caught him before he could get away. They questioned relentlessly and Junior was trapped facing the embarrassment of the whole situation all over again.  

 

Irwin was thankful his grandmother was damn near blind, so when she didn't believe him about not having company he was able to blame the noise on the tv that was, unlike Irwin's company, not actually in the room. She did however notice the vague pink and red blob over the brown blob wearing a white blob that was her grandson. That was about .5 second away from her going full sas on the boy's ass for taking the unfinished sweater. If it were not for the puddles of blood and banana mush covering the floor Irwin is shore he'd have had been burned to a crisp. Instead the old woman slipped with a loud thump onto the floor. 

 

Irwin yelled out for his grandmama asking if she was alright, luckily nurses soon entered the room to aid them. Except for one who stood in the doorway screaming, probably assuming the blood had come from the elderly woman babbling in a puddle on the floor. It was chaos between explaining what had happened and trying not to get in the way of nurses cleaning and trying to help the old woman. Irwin was eventually simply pushed in the hall. Looking down he saw "Mandy" staring worry covering her face. Irwins heart melt again at her showing concern for him. 

 

"Ill.. Uh.. See you tomorrow, yo?" Irwin offered in poor attempt to reassure the girl he pined to dearly after. 

She let out a meek "uh, ok. Seeya" before leaving Irwin to his own devices. 

* * *

 

Junior walked through the door of his home that night still covered in blood and exhausted. He exchanged a knowing look to his mother who was in similar state that simply meant 'I'm tired AF, goodnight"  

After a long angsty shower, where Junior stood for 45 minutes under warm water and thought about his life, he got ready for bed. Snuggling in beside his best friend, Mr. Bonkers, he grabbed the journal from his nightstand and began to write. Most of it was simply recalling the day's events, and trying to sort out his own feelings.

Once he wrote them all down it was official. 

"I like Irwin.." He quietly read it allowed letting it sink it. Along with the grim realization of what exactly he's been doing the past few days. Guilt and Regret washed over Junior as he'd been lying to his friend, his crush, and taking advantage of him. Irwin had no idea that the person he kissed was Junior, but Junior did it anyway. Not even to mention he got mandy involved by association without taking in her feelings. Mandy didn't like Irwin, she hired Junior specifically to keep him away from her. But now Irwin was convinced that she did like him, and if he was relentless in his advances before imagine how horrible it'd be for both of them now that Irwin thinks he has a chance  

 Junior couldn't let this continue.

Tomorrow, he had to make things right. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorta short chapter, but hey that grammar and junk is better this time
> 
> I really need to hurry up and finish this thing, i keep forgetting what i wrote and the continuities getting all swashy 
> 
> bluh anyway hope u enjoy


	7. Wherefore art thou Mandy, yo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Irwin's such a dork yet he doesn't understand shakespeare.

 Irwin had been poked, prodded, questioned examined, and questioned again until the doctors either gave him a (relatively) clean bill of health.. or they just got to annoyed with the kid mouth breathing all over the place with a disgusting love-struck look plastered on his face. Probably the latter, considering the level of nosebleeding and fainting this kid seemed to be experiencing was nowhere near normal level unless this was an anime, which as much as it pained Irwin to admit, it was not. 

Though, Irwin didn't seem to care too much about that fact at the moment. He was walking on air and didn't have a care in the world. Not even the grounding his father gave him for scaring the bejeezus out of the whole family, followed by annoying said whole family to death with even more lovestruck ramblings, and not to mention ruining his all grandmama's hard work on that sweater, could ruin his moon. The Irwins decided that some time ought to do the kid some good. 

Yup, even being forced to stay in his room for the rest of the school break away from his beloved wasn't enough to wipe the dopy smile off his face because all he could think about was how his plan had worked! Mandy kissed him! It was messy and awkward but she kissed him and liked him enough to want to see him again! Just the fact that she hasn't threatened to inflict him with bodily harm in days was enough to make Irwin feel like it was all a dream! 

As he walked back into his house all he could think about is getting to the phone as quickly as possible to text Mandy. He wanted nothing more than text her non-stop until school started again and then they could meet gloriously in the halls and he would wear a beautiful flowy white shirt to insinuate his abs that are totally there and she would wear her regular pink dress that was suddenly long and with a sexy slit up one side of the legs and was also flowing in the wind and he would scoop her up on his majestic white stallion and embrace her for all the student body to see! It would be magnificent and everyone will know, they were going steady. 

Irwin raced to his room and looked back at his phone to see another text from mandy:

"I hope that you get better soon. Please call me when you are free to meet up again. We need to talk."  

Oh man, the mostly-monster hybrid boy stared at the last statement. "We need to talk". That's what people say when something bad is happening. Many was going to break up with him wasn't she! Irwin gave himself a good **SMACK** across the face. No, she's not gonna break up with him, they _just_ got together, besides she's got it bad for him, he always knew it. If anything Mandy probably just wants to ask him to marry her or something, yeah that's it. He'd of course say yes and cry and hug her and never let go. They'd probably have to elope somewhere far where minors can get married without parental consent. Irwin was about to look up marriage age laws in different states when he noticed another notification that he hadn't seen before. 

Oh! Mandy left him a voicemail to, it would be so nice to hear her voice!! Before opening it he made sure to save the file on his phone and email it to himself so he could have a copy on his computer to make a re-mix with later. Girls like sappy stuff like that right? Yeah. Unfortunately once opened, Irwin came to the realization that making a re-mix with this would be difficult considering it was nothing but static and faint breathing... and the... oh my.. occasional rustling of clothes. 20 minutes of this. Twenty minutes of breathing and shifting. This.. this couldn't be what he thought it was. He considered for a moment it was possibly a butt dial but of course it wasn't, what is this 2006? No.. this was no butt dial.. it had to be.. a BOOTY CALL. His DEAR SWEET MANDY HAD BOOTY CALLED HIM AND HE WAS NOWHERE TO ANSWER!! HE HAD TO CALL HER BACK IMMEDIATELY!   

The poor kid was shaking with suspense as the phone rang. 

"Hello, Irw-" 

 

"MANDY!" 

 

"Oh, uh yeah. I'm glad you called, we need to- "

Junior attempted to cut to the chase before being cut off. 

 

"OH MANDY, I GOT YOUR MESSAGE YO. I'M SO SORRY I DIDN'T ANSWER!" 

 

"uh, that's ok it wa-"

 

"I WISH I COULD BE THERE WITH YOU NOW! BUT I'M GROUNDED, I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE FINE CAUSE WE COULD STILL JUST TEXT AND STUFF BUT, OH MAN, MANDY I'M SO SORRY, YO" 

 

"Irwin really its- " 

 

"Shhush, you don't need to tell me I can feel the disappointment in your voice already. Tonight, my love, yo. I'll sneak out if i have to but we I gotta see you!"  Irwin flopped on the bed dramatically, 

 

"uh, ok. We can t-"

This time instead of being cut off once again by Irwin, Junior was instead was interrupted by a loud knocking coming from Irwin's line followed by muffled yelling that he couldn't quite make out. 

 

"Oh shit, I have to go.. BUT DON'T WORRY LOVE THIS IS ONLY GOODBYE FOR NOW, YO!" 

Irwin quickly got off the phone to answer the door and (badly) lie to his father about not being on the phone, or even having a phone, much less knowing what a sseell-you-lar  ff-oh-an is! What sort of object is that, yo? He hadn't the slightest idea. This went on for a very comedic five minutes until Irwin's father gave up and retreated, with the weak promise of being back if he heard the boy on it again. 

* * *

 

Junior tried, ok. He tried really hard to do the write thing but Irwin was NOT making it easy with the whole 'talking over him' thing on the phone, and now texting nothing but heart emoji's and un-decipherable combinations of letters and punctuation. Junior attempted to text out the truth about the whole situation but kept hitting a character limit whenever he tried, and Junior was to afraid to split it into separate messages in the event Irwin may read only the first one and misunderstand. The constant vibrations and dinging of the phone getting new message notifications that Junior couldn't for the life of himself figure out how to turn off weren't exactly helping him concentrate on composing the message either. He figured that he'd simply have to wait until tonight when Irwin would supposedly 'sneak out'. Thus Junior did the only thing he could do and set the phone aside to take a nap. 

A few hours later a suspicious lack of buzzing woke him up. Junior checked his phone to see more ungodly teenage hieroglyphics, with the latest text being just barely readable. 

'pa tuk phn awy. on ttl lock↓ yo! TnT'

Te was thankful to have at least been able to tell that the first part was Irwin saying his phone had been taking away, but the whole 'TnT' had Junior a bit concerned about what exactly his friend/crush was planning on doing with explosives. Junior decided that now was probably the time to go over to meet Irwin. 

* * *

 

 

Irwin hated it, his dad finally managed to get his phone away and was now staying up way later than normal. There was no way he could sneak out like this! And with his beloved waiting for him to!! So what if he ruined hours of work on a sweater, and annoyed his family, and lied about Mandy being his his hospital room, and made a complete mess of said hospital room getting, the fact that he was in such a prison away from the girl of his dreams was more criminal than anything he'd done! 

He opened his window thinking about maybe escaping out from there, but it was too high and Irwin _just_ got out of the hospital, so that option was off the table. It was doomed, there was simply nothing he could do. He leaned against the window seal and sighed wistfully into the night. Then he dorkily (and incorrectly) quoted shakespeare aloud, because he was deep like that.  

"Oh, Mandy, yo. Oh Mandy, yo. Wherefore art thou, Mandy, yo?" 

 

Junior heard this as he was approaching the house and for a moment stopped as he let the feeling in his gut weigh on him. Irwin was asking 'Why are you Mandy?'... Did. Did Irwin know this whole time, that he was only pretending to be Mandy? Junior started panicking, this whole time he knew?? Oh god and they kissed, and Irwin kissed him, knowing it was him!?  Why.. Why didn't he say anything?? God what if he was just seeing how far Junior would go, he was probably laughing at him this whole time! Junior started to spiral into thought after thought, convincing himself that Irwin somehow knew this whole time and was making fun of him or using him to fufil some fantacy or.. _something_?! He felt so stupid, even worse he felt guilty and humiliated for assuming Irwin was stupid enough to not see through it. In hindsight it was so obvious! Jr was a horrible actor!

Quickly the guilt and humiliation boiled in his veins and became instead a tangible rage. 

 

"Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?" 

Junior seethed out just loud enough to catch Irwin's attention without alarming the other occupants inside.  

 

"Mandy!!" 

Just when Irwin was poetically wondering _where_  she was, she had appeared! It was fate he knew it! Irwin plastered a huge smile on his face but before he could open his mouth again to speak she spoke first. 

 

"We need to break up."  

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow, goodness i havent updated this in a while!  
> we're almost done tho! so not much more waiting! (and thx for those who have been sticking around!)

**Author's Note:**

> \--ty to a friend, eastervampire for coming up with the idea--  
> ps: this is the first fic i've ever actually written so please feel free to comment and critique!
> 
> EDIT: I'm currently working on fixing up some of the major spelling and grammar errors, (even still dont expect it to be perfect)


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